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Blogging on the inner workings of business tech including, but not limited to, business intelligence (BI), analytics, enterprise software, desktop and portable hardware, IT in education, open-source p

Ben Woods

With a psychology degree under his belt, Ben set off on a four-year sojourn as a professional online poker player, but as the draw of the gambling life began to wane his attentions turned to more wholesome employment.With several years' experience covering everything in the world of telecoms and mobility, Ben's your man if it involves a smartphone, tablet, laptop, or any other piece of tech small enough to carry around with you. He's also keenly interested in broadband issues, and has spent more time than strictly necessary testing out a multitude of software packages.Hot tips (no tittering at the back) can be passed along to me at ben.woods@zdnet.com or you can follow me on Twitter @BenWoodsZD, if you can bear intermittent cake and cat tweets.

Latest Posts

Alcatel-Lucent has developed a system called LightRadio that it says will help people to easily connect to Wi-Fi connections at home or hotspots when on the move.The company said that LightRadio would allow people to move between 3G mobile connections, personal Wi-Fi and public Wi-Fi hotspots seamlessly by removing the need to log-in to different networks.

HP has delivered more components of the Open WebOS platform, which include a new Isis web browser and extensions to the QtWebKit.It is the second time the company has released parts of the Open WebOS platform since it decided to open source it in December 2011.

Internet service provider TalkTalk has joined the likes of BT and Sky in blocking the Usenet aggregator Newzbin2.The company confirmed on Tuesday that it had been forced to begin the blocking process following receipt of a court order in January.

Three and Everything Everywhere will spend £25m improving mobile network coverage in Northern Ireland before the end of 2012.The companies announced the co-operative deal, which is designed to improve network stability, performance and customer experience, on Monday.

Asus has said that an update for its Eee Pad Transformer and Transformer Prime is still on the way despite delays to the previously expected schedule.The company posted on its Facebook wall on Monday to reassure owners of the tablets that it would still be issuing an update to the most recent version of Google Android as soon as possible.

Apple has filed a suit in San Diego federal court accusing Motorola of breaching its licensing agreement with Qualcomm over a chip used in the iPhone 4S.The Californian company's latest filing revolves around technology found in the iPhone 4S's MDM6610 baseband chip, which is made by Qualcomm and contains technology licensed from Motorola.

Vodafone is considering whether to make an offer for networking and telecoms company Cable & Wireless.The UK mobile operator said on Monday that it was considering whether to put in a bid for Bracknell-based Cable & Wireless Worldwide (CWW).

Phones 4u has launched a new mobile plan that allows users to get a new handset as often as every six months for an additional monthly premium.The mobile retailer introduced the new JUMP — Just Upgrade My Phone — plan on Friday following the completion of a trial scheme that started in May 2011 in 100 Phones 4u stores.

Lenovo's ThinkPad Tablet will be updated to the most recent version of the Android operating system, known as Ice Cream Sandwich, within the next three months.The update will begin to roll out globally in May, the company said in an announcement on Wednesday.

A 26-year-old Hungarian man has been sentenced to more than two years in prison, after he attempted to blackmail Marriot International into giving him a job by threatening to reveal sensitive information about the hotel chain.Attila Nemeth pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 30 months in prison for transmitting a malicious code to the company and threatening to reveal secrets about the company's computers.

Apple was forced to remove several iOS devices from sale on its German online store on Thursday as a result of its patent battles with Motorola.The iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4 and 3G iPads are currently not available from the company's web store in Germany following a ruling in favour of Motorola relating to FRAND-pledged patents declared essential to 3G standards.

Yahoo has officially launched an app search tool that works across both iPhone and Android to let people find mobile apps.App Search was announced on Wednesday, but went live in the UK at the end of last year, following an initial release in the US.

Open-source software provider Red Hat has said it will support its current generation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 for 10 years, adding three years to the platform's lifecycle.Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 5 will also now have a 10-year lifecycle, the company said in a blog post on Tuesday.